Lunar Flowers
by masollan
Summary: a vignette collection of Cloud and Aerith.
1. moonscape

**Author's Note:** The title was pretty much derived from the anime, Wolf's Rain; this is a vignette collection though, and I'm just merely using the title because it suits Cloud and Aerith as a couple very much.

* * *

 **Lunar Flowers  
** _i. moonscape_

 _._

 _._

They have reached the middle of nowhere, restless and burned out after another series of monsters and revelations... and some bouts of more trouble and disagreement.

Her eyes traveled around her resting comrades, all too tired to utter a word. Barret had just unloaded the machine on his arm, drenching a cloth with grease before cleaning out the gun. Next to him was Tifa, cozied on the belly of a quite scruffier Red XIII. She also noticed Tifa's bandaged hands, and she couldn't help but wonder how such beautiful and delicate hands learned to brawl. To Tifa's side was another raven-haired female. Yuffie had her arms over her head to support its weight. Not for long, she whistled a tune.

She could not help but smile at this, her head bobbing to the sound. Brushing a hand from the loose locks of her hair, she looked at the other side of their makeshift camp in the prairie.

A few yards away from everyone else, Cait Sith was intently watching the man next to him make some repairs of the airship. Cid had been busying himself with the Highwind since twilight, and had not even eaten his portion of dinner. Although, from what Aerith could tell, the relentless coughing of the engine told her it wasn't a good sign. And while observing the old man, Vincent had just exited the aircraft; his eyes catching hers. She did not avert her eyes away from him, instead smiled at him, as the red-cladded man nodded back on her.

Aerith peeped through the flames of the campfire, hazily marveling Cloud's back as red burned her forest-green eyes. Although it was pitch-dark, she could tell that he sat quite stiff, unnecessary movements, none. He remained silently seated, with his sword beside him as he faced the faintly-twinkling tars. He had been like that quite a while now, and her hands yearned for his.

The stars seemed to fade one after another. He could not remember the last time he had looked at the sky for so long, and getting lost with it. But now more than ever had he needed to be lost. This journey in saving the world had not been his intentions – and the rest that this supposed side-trip could offer was not what he had expected.

But it was not pain, but anxiety that was building up in his heart as more days pass by; for some moments he would witness flashes of random images, and fragments of memories often in white gossamer. The memories felt estranged to him; but there was something familiar about them, too. He reckoned, maybe they could be his past lives – but his estranged childhood 'friend' begs to differ.

An episode like this will be followed through, by what his comrades will report, 'an outrageous act of treachery and violence'. According to the red-cloaked gunner, the short story was, he had almost fallen into a trap, after attacking everyone else. He also told him that he suspected that the trap was planned by no one else but the silver-haired lunatic.

What the foul-mouthed pilot followed through after this little detail had made Cloud even more bothered. He was unable to believe, that just hours ago, he was so close in becoming the murderer of the last Cetra, had it not been for his robot-prosthetic-armed comrade to beat the daylights out of him.

Of this, Cloud had been told so, after regaining his consciousness.

And here it was, the awkward nighttime. Hugging his legs, he could not admit that even he feared himself, and that maybe it was best if he were to resign this mission. The worst thing was, the little thief from Wutai even tried to make him feel better, by saying he was not himself.

Maybe he really isn't what he thought he was.

And before he could continue to beat himself up, he felt her gloveless hand, picked up her scent. Aerith seemed to perpetually smell like honey and lilies.

He looked at the fragile fingers that rested on top of his shoulder, before his cyanic eyes looked back to the night sky. And when there was no moon to cry on, he could not help but hold her bruised hand, silently asking for her to forgive him, even just a little.


	2. lonelilies

.

.

 **Lunar Flowers**  
 _ii. lonelilies_

 _._

 _._

He just finished planting some new buds at the other side of the flowerbed; a skill she taught and he welcomed, but not so much because he has a new-found fascination for flowers and gardening.

Cloud carefully followed the trail of droplets raining down on her lilies as she watered them in the golden afternoon; just enough to dampen the soil and not drown them. There was very little wind and sound, but he breathed with ease as the growing plants cleared in the atmosphere of a ruin within the slums.

Today, Aerith was unlikely quiet. The absence of her usual recklessness and carefree humor would translate her charm into divine beauty whenever her face was devoid of smile or expression.

Cloud is a man with very few words; his was often meant for responding than initiating. With Aerith, though, he found himself extra generous than his usual.

"They smell nice." he said. _Generous_ – by Cloud's standards of course. He hoped to get a reaction from her. As said, she was unlikely quiet.

She shot her eyes up to him. Her smile would remind him she was still human. "Did you finish?"

Such is the relief.

She placed down the watering can and took off of her gardening gloves. Then sat down next to the flowerbed, while he stood from his end and walked a bit to her direction, before sitting beside her.

Their bare feet basked under the halo that directly beamed towards the flowers, from the now-broken roof where Cloud fell through.

No words came from either of them, as Cloud's eyes remained on her while hers fixated skywards.

The church was vacant of slum children, vendors and machines. For someone who's the last of her kind, silence meant something else. The voices of the Planet often sounded like fragments, echoed pieces coming from several streams of consciousness. There were a lot of words, and they remain incoherent. Incomplete cries that only she could feel, but not fully understand.

Today, they were louder. Crying, shrieking out of anguish, pain, sorrow, and anger. Nothing that Aerith wasn't used to already; nothing that pushes her to the edge, or unsettles her, but there were times she would keep herself quietly wishing for them to stop, even just for a day.

She closed her eyes and leaned onto the man next to her. Aerith felt him stiffen when she did, although that does not bother her. After all, he never refused nor ignored her, in fact he would always indulge her.

She felt him move again, as he adjusted his arm and body and leaned slightly to the right; she believed he did so for her comfort, at the expense of his. She smiled to herself before letting out a deep sigh; one that Cloud will debate over, whether it was out of content or fatigue.

To be indulged by Cloud. The thought still tickles her. And he was not the type to indulge anyone, at all. She just won't believe it until he indulges her again. She wanted to test it - why not _now,_ then?

She grabbed his gloved hands (he is surprised by this, but he would let her do as she likes), softly caressing them, not minding the soil that dirtied the leather.

"Oh, right." he noticed that his was still wearing his gloves. He took them off. Cloud slightly hesitated whether he should hold her hand, but he did anyway. The gesture made Aerith feel warm inside, loved that she didn't even need to ask. Indulging her, he did. She was sure she would do the same for him in exchange. She nuzzled her head against his arm.

 _The voices.._ from loud cries, they now whisper instead.

"Hey Cloud," He slightly turned his head to his shoulder, where her head laid.

"I still can't believe you tended the flowers with me," she chirped as she adoringly wrapped her arms around his. "I can't wait for the ones you planted to bloom."

He subtly mirrors her smile. "Don't get your hopes up." It was his first time to do so after all. He never had the chance to develop a green thumb.

The birds flocked atop the roof. With their singing she was again overwhelmed by the volume of noise inside her head, but her face doesn't give anything away. Cloud notices it again when she doesn't reply to him, and again she was staring up the sky. He looks around the ceiling as well, finding the object of her sight. There was nothing but a few feathered creatures, flirting and singing with each other in tune.

His eyes once again rest on her face. It's been a while now, and he's been thinking, if he was allowed to spend the entirety of his life tending the flowers, sitting beside her; for there was nothing else that made his days as colorful and alive as the darting pink and red she wore.

"Aerith?" she turned her head towards him in an instant.

She answers him with a smile. "What is it?"

"You've been strangely quiet today."

Aerith will not realize how he had just stopped the noise. The many voices ringing in her ears turned mute, it was now the silence they shared that she could only hear.

"It was louder than the usual," she answered as she watched her foot tickle a bloom. "The voices."

Cloud's breath hitched. "I'm sorry."

Aerith laughed. "What are you apologizing for?"

Cloud didn't answer her. Instead, he stood up and landed on the flowerbed in his toes. He reached out to pluck a white lily that he was eyeing on earlier. He turned around, and tucked the stalk behind her ear; his fingers rested beside her cheek as he gazed down to her face.

She was red as she gleamed at him. He was red, and he was smiling, too. He wondered if she was still hearing the voices. He could imagine how it is like - to be alone inside the collective, restless noise. He knows, because he gets pangs of images and memories in his head, things that don't make sense but exist.

But save that problem for another day; for today was like any other day with Aerith. There is no noise, no confusion, no hurt. Not when they're in this little garden, with just them two.

Would it be too selfish of him to ask of this every day?

"Aerith-"

"Cloud!" Aerith's smile turned to a pout. Her index finger pointed to the flowerbed. "You're going have to plant three buds in exchange, you know,"

From his soft, fragile hold, Cloud found his own fingers pinching her cheek. She pretends to be hurt. He'll indulge her again.

On that day they laughed, and only their laughter was heard.


End file.
